How Vasectomies Work

After reading this piece, you may feel ready for vasectomy. After all, if you change your mind later, you can always have vasectomy reversal surgery, right? Or maybe you'll just have some sperm frozen at a sperm bank in case you decide that you want more children one day. While these safety measures sound appealing, most doctors would advise you to reflect further about vasectomy's permanence.

While some men are able to father children after vasectomy reversal, many vasectomy reversals do not work. Banked sperm is not always viable, and sperm banks have been known to lose men's specimens on occasion. Experts recommend that men consider vasectomy as a birth control option only if they are 100 percent positive that they are done having children. Before going through with the procedure, you may want to consider your future. Many men divorce and remarry after vasectomy and then want more children with a new partner. This can lead to frustration and disappointment when vasectomy reversal surgery does not work.

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If your partner is the one pushing for vasectomy because she doesn't want to get pregnant, you may want to talk to her about tubal ligation, or getting her tubes tied. This surgery is a longer, more intensive and expensive surgery, and it has more risks and side effects. For these reasons, and because vasectomy and tubal ligation success rates are similar, many couples opt for vasectomy as their preferred method of sterilization. The decision to have sterilization surgery is highly personal and should be thoroughly discussed with your partner and healthcare practitioners.

For more information on vasectomies and reproductive health, check out the links on the next page.

Female Surgical Sterilization

Even though vasectomy is less complicated and less risky than female surgical sterilization, far more women than men have been sterilized in the United States and around the world, at a rate of almost three to one [source : Barone et al.].